In this column, I will spotlight plotlines by writers that probably weren't a good idea at the time and have only become more problematic in retrospect. I'll try to stick with stuff that's more ill-conceived than flat-out offensive (like racist stereotypes of characters during the 1940s).
Today, we take a look at Egg Fu, an awesome idea for a villain ruined by the character being super racist...
In 1965's Wonder Woman #157 by Robert Kanigher, Ross Andru and Mike Espostio, Steve Trevor is sent on a dangerous spy mission. The first half of this story is CRAZY on its own merits (reader Fraser suggested I feature it), so I'll spotlight it on its own some in the future. But suffice it to say that Trevor is sent on a flying spy mission and we see who it is that he is sent to spy on....
DUDE'S A GIANT RACIST CARICATURE! But he is also a GIANT EVIL EGG! Oh man, this is so painful! It is super racist, but the whole "evil giant egg" thing is SO cool! By the way, we're talking 1965 here, people. It isn't, like, 1935 or whatever. It's just over 50 years ago!!
So the spy planes are all destroyed and Steve manages to eject to safety but is caught by Egg Fu and turned into a human bomb...
That's the cliffhanger of #157 - Wonder Woman and Trevor having to deal with him being a human bomb.
As they deal with that at the beginning of Wonder Woman #158, we check in to make sure Egg Fu is still super racist...
Okay, so Wonder Woman and Steve fix his "human bomb" problem and are seemingly safe, but not until Egg Fu attacks!!!
A giant evil egg who can strangle you with his GIANT MUSTACHE?!? WHY DID KANIGHER HAVE TO MAKE HIM SO SUPER RACIST?!? He would be SUCH a great villain if he wasn't such a huge racist caricature!
On the next page, see Kanigher actually bring him BACK once more a year later and then see how people dealt with him post-Crisis and shockingly enough, in the New 52 even!!
So a year later, in Wonder Woman #166 (same creative team), the bad guys turn out to be Egg Fu and, well, he does about as well as you would expect a giant egg to do in a fight with Wonder Woman...
That was pretty much it for Egg Fu before Crisis. But right in the middle of Crisis, we had Keith Giffen and Robert Loren Fleming's Ambush Bug mini-series. In issue #3, Ambush Bug makes fun of DC's "Who's Who?" line of comics at the time, pointing out the characters DC decided to gloss over in that project, including Egg Fu...
Good stuff.
Post-Crisis, John Byrne brought Egg Fu back in Wonder Woman #128 as a giant computer from Apocalypse...
In the epic yearlong maxi-series, 52, Grant Morrison, Mark Waid, Geoff Johns and Greg Rucka introduced the new, non-racist caricature version of Egg Fu called just Chang Tzu, and he was pretty awesome...
In the new 52, surprisingly enough, Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti (along with artist John Timms) introduced a new version of Egg Fu in Harley Quinn Annual #1, keeping the awesomeness and dropping the racist stuff...
Funny work.
Anyhow, the main lesson is - don't make super racist caricatures in your comic books. But DO make awesome giant egg villains, because that's just good sense.
If anyone has any suggestions for future edition of Things That Turned Out Bad, feel free to drop me a line at bcronin@comicbookresources.com!